Daily Hindu Editorials

👉ISRO MAKING GREEN PROPELLANT  👈(ENVIRONMENT) Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) have reported progress in the development of an environment-friendly propellant to power satellites and spacecraft in a bid to replace the highly polluting rocket fuels. 👉Why? The propellent ISRO currently uses, conventional hydrazine rocket fuel, is a highly toxic and carcinogenic chemical. Hydrazine has dominated the space industry as the choice of propellant for over six decades, despite its environment and health hazards and the challenges faced in its manufacturing, storage, ground handling and transportation, due to its high performance characteristics. But now the research is looking at replacing it with greener propellant blend based on hydroxylammonium nitrate (HAN). 👉Who? Initial tests by a research team at the Liquid Propulsion Systems Centre (LPSC) have shown promising results in the formulation 👉ITBP TO GET MORE MEN AND MATERIAL👈  (INTERNAL SECURITY) Th...

💥 Daily Word Bytes - 2  from editorial  - Hezbollah’s grip — On Lebanon's parliamentary election  💥 grip (noun) – control, power/influence, hold. Hindu Editorial usage :   Hezbollah’s grip — On Lebanon's parliamentary election mounting (adjective) – increasing, growing, intensifying. Hindu Editorial usage :   Results of Lebanon’s May 6 parliamentary election point to the mounting frustration among voters with the government of Prime Minister Saad Hariri a host of (noun) – lot, large number, great quantity. Hindu Editorial usage :     Lebanon has had a host of administrative and regional challenges while the government remained largely ineffective in tackling them. breakdown (noun) – failure, collapse, foundering. Hindu Editorial usage :     There were protests in Beirut and elsewhere over a breakdown of waste management; there is an acute power shortage;   shambles (noun) – complete mess, disorder/disarray, diso...

💥 Daily Word Bytes - 1  from editorial  - Collective Assertion  💥 assertion (noun) – declaration, statement, contention. Hindu Editorial usage :     Collective assertion — On Justice Joseph’s elevation elevation (noun) – promotion, upgrading, advancement. Hindu Editorial usage :     Collective assertion — On Justice Joseph’s elevation propriety (noun) – morality, correctness, decency. Hindu Editorial usage :     The propriety of the Centre holding back names from the collegium’s list is in question hold back (phrasal verb) – withhold, delay, refuse to disclose/act. Hindu Editorial usage :     The propriety of the Centre holding back names from the collegium’s list is in question collegium system (noun) – The collegium system is the one in which the Chief Justice of India and a forum of four senior most judges of the Supreme Court recommend appointments & transfers of judges. There is no mention of the colleg...

👉The growing conflict between Dalits and Hindutva must be seen in the context of the paradigm shift in U.P. politics👈 Uttar Pradesh’s pivotal importance to Indian politics is hard to exaggerate. Anyone who wishes to rule India must control this State. The Bhartiya Janata Party’s (BJP’s) biggest win in 2014 came from U.P., which was instrumental in providing Narendra Modi with a clear majority in the Lok Sabha. The party won 73 (with its ally) of the State’s 80 seats, while its nearest rivals, the Samajwadi Party (SP) and the Congress, got only five and two seats, respectively. The BJP repeated this performance in the 2017 Assembly election, winning 325 seats (with its ally) in the 403-member State Assembly, which is about 80% of the seats. No party has ever registered such a colossal tally, not even Indira Gandhi, whose party, the Congress, had won 309 seats in the then 425-member Assembly in 1980. 👉An alienation But barely a year after its stunning victory the situation...

👉The propriety of the Centre holding back names from the collegium’s list is in question👈 It may no longer be possible for the Union government to delay Justice K.M. Joseph’s elevation to the Supreme Court. The five-member collegium has unanimously agreed, in principle, to reiterate its recommendation to appoint the Chief Justice of the Uttarakhand High Court as a judge of the Supreme Court. When reiterated unanimously, the Centre is bound to act on the collegium resolution, going by the law laid down by the Supreme Court in the Third Judges Case of 1998. The Centre, which denies that its objection had anything to do with Justice Joseph’s decision in 2016 to quash the imposition of President’s Rule in Uttarakhand, ought not to delay his appointment once the reiteration is formally made. However, it is puzzling that the collegium didn’t send its reiteration to the Centre immediately. It has decided that his name would be part of the next set of recommendations, which would include...

👉Parliamentary results sharpen divides in Lebanon, amid rising tensions in West Asia👈 Results of Lebanon’s May 6 parliamentary election point to the mounting frustration among voters with the government of Prime Minister Saad Hariri. In recent years, Lebanon has had a host of administrative and regional challenges while the government remained largely ineffective in tackling them. There were protests in Beirut and elsewhere over a breakdown of waste management; there is an acute power shortage; the economy is in a shambles; and the inward flight of Syrian refugees over the past seven years has put public infrastructure under further strain. Regional tensions are high as Hezbollah, Lebanon’s most powerful Shia movement that has been designated by the U.S. and Israel as a terrorist organisation, is involved in the Syrian civil war. In post-civil war Lebanon, the political class is largely divided into two blocs — the Iran-allied Shia bloc led by Hezbollah that has joined hands with...

👉Political alignments should not come in the way of defending the fiscal rights of States 👈 My fellow Finance Ministers in the States, I hope you will agree that the award of the Finance Commission is vital to State finances. Some of us who met initially at Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala, and later at Amaravati, Andhra Pradesh, are worried about the implications of the terms of reference (ToR) of the Finance Commission determined by the Union government. The issues related to inter se distribution of resources are what have drawn attention and made headlines. But the issues at stake are much larger. What the ToR challenge are the federal values enshrined in the Constitution and the modicum of fiscal autonomy State governments enjoy. I am writing this open letter just in case you have misunderstood that our concerns are limited to a change in the population base year, from 1971 to 2011, which would in fact affect not only the southern States in general but also other States where ...